When we started Centerpoint, we knew our area didn't need another church–but it did need a different kind of church. An alternative to church as usual for the approximately 60,000 people in our community who were unchurched, dechurched, or who had walked away from Jesus. A church where you could belong before you believe. A church that was the safest place for anyone struggling with anything. A church that was welcoming and accessible to all people. A church where both the believer and the agnostic could sit alongside one another and be inspired to learn about and follow Jesus. So we reimagined a church that in the words of the Apostle Peter, would “not make it difficult for people who are turning to God" (Acts 15:19).

From Centerpoint’s inception, fulfilling this vision has always required extraordinary steps of faith and sacrifice. We launched with a group of fifty people, with no outside help or financing, and they began to give and serve unselfishly. I quit my job, invested what I had, and launched Centerpoint along with this team. It was a huge risk, but we had a dream to change this city.

We prayed and we moved in faith, and God began to faithfully provide every step of the way. Soon we began to see people being baptized; atheists began to follow Jesus; those disillusioned with the church found a home; and children began to love the local church. Exactly what we prayed for began to happen. We continued to take bold steps of faith, even when we didn’t have the resources, because we cared so much about reaching the people nobody else was reaching in our city. 

Over time, our gathering grew by hundreds of people. At times, the growth was slow and steady, and in other seasons, we saw exponential growth—I’ll never forget the Sunday we doubled our attendance from the weekend prior! People were experiencing an alternative to church as usual—and became as passionate as we are about sharing that vision with their own neighbors, coworkers, friends and family. By 2015, space began to be a huge obstacle, and in the successive years, we took many bold steps of faith to address the tension. Ultimately, those steps led us to take over our current location, which we acquired in 2020. It was a much larger facility with more seating, but within weeks of moving in we were out of space and had grown by hundreds of people yet again.

Then COVID-19 hit in the Spring of 2020, and as we all know, the entire world seemed to change overnight. COVID gave us breathing room, for the first time in years, to prepare for the future. But now, those space issues are back. Our children’s environments are at max capacity on many Sundays, and our adult services are nearing that benchmark. It is time to take another extraordinary step of faith to increase ministry capacity for this next chapter of Centerpoint’s story. 

What you do now will be part of the story you tell: one that either says, “I got to be a part of this movement,” or “I had a chance to be a part of this movement.” I don’t want you to miss it! 

Centerpoint’s growth has always been fueled by people willing to sacrifice, step forward in faith and own this vision. So, I’m inviting you to participate in reimagining once again the future for our community, for our families, and for the next generation. It’s important to know that this is not about building a building; it’s about more people finding life and freedom in Jesus. We don’t know their names yet, but in the next few years, thousands of people will be impacted forever because of what you do in this moment. We will walk into that new facility and people will go public with their faith through baptism; multi-generational tides will change; people will find hope in a marriage; others will be saved from suicide; still more awakened to the fact that God’s love is relentless, unending and never runs out. We don’t know their names yet, but we will get to be a part of their story forever. 

Let’s take this next step of faith together. A step that will outlast all of us and have more far-reaching impact than we could ever accomplish alone.